TiVoPlex
By John Seal
April 26, 2010
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Tuesday 4/27/10
5:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
Savage Pampas (1966 ESP-ARG-USA): Robert Taylor stars in this bizarre Euro-western set in Argentina, not the American west (and shot, naturally, in Almeria, Spain). Taylor plays Captain Martin, an army officer trying to tame the wild South American frontier of the 1860s. To accomplish this task, he needs troops…and to keep his troops happy, he needs women. After a convoy of prostitutes arrives at his fort, he uses them to win back the loyalty of some deserters, and his re-invigorated army sets out to defeat the Injuns and their villainous leader Padron (Ron Randell). Apparently based on an Argentinian film from the 1940s, Savage Pampas is not quite as kooky as it sounds - Taylor is as wooden as ever - but gets a very rare widescreen airing today. Look for Hollywood tough guy Marc Lawrence as Martin’s second in command.
9:00 PM IFC
Buddy Boy (1999 USA): Featuring the great Susan Tyrrell as a monstrous stepmother, Buddy Boy is the product of a genuinely independent American cinema, and all the better for it. That's not to suggest that it's a great film - it certainly isn't - but director Mark Hanlon proves it's possible to make a film with attitude, style, and ambition without sucking up to what critic Dave Poland calls the "dependents", faux-independents such as Paramount Classics and Fox Searchlight. Tyrrell plays Sal, a harridan who shares a musty apartment with good Catholic stepson Francis (Aidan Gillen), whose job as a photo developer provides him an escape from the hectoring demands of Mom. He also finds relief by spying on his attractive neighbor (Emmanuelle Seigner), and the film reflects the influence of voyeuristic creep-out efforts ranging from Michael Powell's Peeping Tom (1960) to Todd Solondz’ Happiness (1998). If you're an admirer of those films, you'll get your moneys worth from Buddy Boy; if not, you can probably give it a miss.
Wednesday 4/28/10
1:45 AM Turner Classic Movies
Tip on a Dead Jockey (1957 USA): This title used to fascinate me when I was a kid. Whenever it appeared in TV Guide (my magazine of choice for many years), I would ponder the meaning of the word ‘tip’ and the provenance of the dead jockey. I guess I wasn’t well-informed about gambling on the gee-gees in those days, but even so…well, how (and why) would you put money on an expired horseman? Surprisingly, I never actually got around to watching Tip on a Dead Jockey back in the day, but it’s making its TCM debut this morning and is firmly in my sights. Robert Taylor’s in this one, too, apparently as a pilot who gets mixed up with international smuggling. So, again…what does horse-racing have to do with international smuggling? I have no idea, but I’ll finally be finding out. Directed by Richard Thorpe and co-starring Jack Lord as Taylor’s wartime buddy and drinking partner, Tip on a Dead Jockey airs in widescreen this morning.
5:00 PM Fox Movie Channel
Raising Arizona (1987 USA): I'm not the world's biggest fan of this particular Coen Brothers film: its sneering attitude toward the uneducated white working class (otherwise known as crackers or rednecks) has always rubbed me the wrong way. But there is something undeniably sweet at the heart of the film, and the performances by Nicolas Cage and Holly Hunter, while still grounded in stereotypes, nonetheless won me over the second and third time I watched the film. Featuring Coen regulars John Goodman and Frances McDormand and an especially good performance by Trey Wilson (who saved the otherwise hard-to-watch Great Balls of Fire with his performance as record producer Sam Phillips), Raising Arizona is also getting the letterboxed treatment this time out.
Thursday 4/29/10
9:15 PM Turner Classic Movies
Hitler (1962 USA): It’s no-one’s idea of a great film, but there’s something undeniably intriguing about this biopic. It all starts with the casting, of course: who would ever consider hiring the impeccably bland Richard Basehart to play the 20th Century’s number one evil-doer? Then again, the guy did appear in two Fellini films, and concluded his somewhat perfunctory big screen career in Hal Ashby’s Being There, so say what you will about Basehart—he got around, and (whisper it) isn’t entirely terrible as Der Fuhrer. The film attempts to plumb the depths of Hitler’s psychology (hey, it’s cheaper than staging a bunch of tank battles), and co-stars ubiquitous screen Nazi Martin Kosleck as Joseph Goebbels, as well as Sergeant Schultz himself, John Banner, and The Mary Tyler Moore Show’s Ted Knight! Perhaps Werner Klemperer and Gavin MacLeod were otherwise engaged during the Hitler casting call.
Friday 4/30/10
7:00 AM More Max
Tank (1983 USA): This completely (some would argue rightfully) forgotten action comedy from Lorimar features James Garner as Zack Carey, an Army Sergeant Major looking to shake up a corrupt small town in the American South. Carey crosses swords with local lawman Cyrus Buelton (G. D. Spradlin), who has his hands in all sorts of lucrative but illegal pots - including prostitution. Buelton is not about to give up his second job without a fight, however, and frames Zack’s teenage son Billy (C. Thomas Howell) for drug dealing. This doesn’t sit well with our hero, of course, who fires up his Sherman tank (we all have one, right?) and proceeds to lay waste to the local jail with it! Yes, it’s as absurd as it sounds, but is quite good fun, and co-stars James Cromwell as Euclid, Buelton’s henchman, and Shirley Jones as LaDonna, Carey’s feisty wife.
5:00 PM Turner Classic Movies
Background to Danger (1943 USA): Sidney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre made nine films together, including Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon. This is one of the other seven, and you’d be forgiven if you haven’t heard of it before. That’s not to say it’s not worth watching, however: besides the two legendary character actors, the film headlines George Raft as Joe Barton, a Yank in Istanbul trying to keep Turkey neutral during World War II. His efforts are impeded by Nazi agent Robinson (Greenstreet), who’s working hard to duplicate the Reichstag Fire and get the Turks on side with the Reich. Also on hand: Brenda Marshall as Lorre’s wife (Peter himself portrays a Soviet spy, back when Soviet spies were the good guys) and the legendary Turhan Bey (still with is today, and 88 years young) as one of Joe’s Turkish chums.
11:15 PM Turner Classic Movies
Incubus (1966 USA): This is the only feature film ever shot entirely in Esperanto, the ‘international language’ invented in 1887 by Polish intellectual L.L. Zamenhof. It also stars William Shatner. Still not convinced to check it out? It’s a horror film shot by Conrad Hall and scored by Dominic Frontiere. Still not convinced? Then there’s no hope for you—cancel your cable or satellite subscription and trash the TV.
Sunday 5/02/10
11:15 AM The Movie Channel
Pontypool (2009 CAN): There’s always time for another first in the TiVoPlex. For example, there’s this film, the first travelogue I’ve ever recommended - though frankly, it’s a pretty odd choice for the genre. Located near the South Wales coalfields, Pontypool is a decaying industrial town with a terrific rugby team, one of the best male chorus’s you’ll ever hear, and the country’s highest standard gauge railway.
What?
It’s a horror film about a small Canadian town being overrun by virus-carrying zombies? A virus spread by words and sounds, not by infected saliva? Starring Steven McHattie as a radio DJ holed up in a basement studio, trying to spread word to the outside world of Pontypool’s desperate plight?
Yeah, of course I knew that!
Also airs at 2:15 PM!
9:30 PM Turner Classic Movies
Captain Salvation (1927 USA): This silent feature has aired previously on TCM, but I don’t think I’ve written about it before. Directed by Old John Robertson (presumably whilst wearing a stetson hat), the film tells the tale of a sailor torn between his love for the sea and his love for God. Lars Hanson stars as aspiring pastor Anson Campbell, whose heart bleeds for Bess Morgan (Pauline Starke), a woman of questionable virtue sailing aboard the same convict ship Anson just so happens to be crewing. When she rejects the untoward advances of the ship’s skipper (Ernest Torrence), Anson realizes she has a heart of gold, and determines to help her regain her good name and the respect of their neighbors back in Maple Harbour, Massachusetts. Hanson had previously played Reverend Dimmesdale in Victor Sjostrom’s superior 1926 version of The Scarlet Letter, so playing another liberal clergyman wasn’t much of a stretch for him. Captain Salvation is no lost silent classic, but it’s still worth a look for William Daniel’s excellent shipboard cinematography and Starke’s nuanced performance as the bad girl who just might not be so bad after all.